Feds Free Up Dow Towers Money … Finally

Dow Towers has finally received an annual allotment of federal money that had been held up by the sequester and other issues in Washington, DC.

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) awarded Hopkins’ Housing and Redevelopment Authority (HRA) received $65,198 as part of a $27 million package for large-scale public housing improvements.

Hopkins receives this money every year to help fund capital projects—but it normally gets the money early in the year, said Stacy Unowsky, the city’s public housing manager. This year, though, the money wasn’t announced until Thursday.

“It was hard to plan for,” Unowsky said.

The upside is that this year’s amount is slightly more than the $62,000 Hopkins received last year. But it’s a far cry from the $100,000 or more the HRA got five or six years ago.

The money will pay for the second phase of remodeling kitchens that are unchanged from when they were originally put in four decades ago, Unowsky said.  The HRA just approved the first phase of the project at Tuesday’s meeting.

Unowsky expects the finished kitchens to be “fabulous” and is pleased to have the money—however late it may be.

“Any amount we’ll put to good use,” she said.